Colleges: Former St. John's stars play key roles for WPI

WPI teammates and former St. John's High stars Chad LaBove and Matt Harrington have embraced their supporting roles this season.

"If you're a St. John's fan and you read the box scores you're going to be like, 'Oh, these guys aren't doing much,'" WPI coach Chris Bartley said before Tuesday's practice, "but if you're coaching the team or you're playing with these guys, you know these guys do so much."

LaBove, WPI's senior starting center, is averaging 2 points and 4.5 rebounds. Harrington, a junior guard, is averaging 2.3 points, mostly coming off the bench. He started WPI's last four games of the regular season, which were all victories.

"It's about intangibles," Bartley said. "That's their hallmark. They bring a great composure to our team. At St. John's under coach Bob Foley they played in a lot of big games. Nothing really fazes them. Guys on this team respond to them."

No. 11 WPI (22-3, 12-2) won its second straight regular-season NEWMAC title and will host this weekend's NEWMAC tournament at Harrington Auditorium. WPI will face the winner of tonight's quarterfinal between MIT and Emerson in a semifinal at 1 p.m. Saturday. The championship is at 1 p.m. Sunday. The winner earns an automatic NCAA Tournament berth.

The Engineers will be seeking their eighth NCAA appearance in Bartley's 13 seasons.

Harrington and LaBove helped lead St. John's to the Division 1 state crown in 2009. Their run of success has obviously continued at WPI. LaBove transferred to WPI after his freshman year at Wesleyan.

"Coach Foley was great — he taught us how basketball should be played," Harrington said. "We got the winning going and winning became part of my and Chad's personalities. We're smart players, we know what it takes to win and I think we carried that over when we came into WPI."

Harrington and LaBove both grew up in Shrewsbury and their families are close. Postgame dinners at The Boynton have been a tradition for them the last six years or so.

WPI won 26 games last season, was ranked as high as No. 2 in the D3hoops.com top 25 poll and advanced to the second round of the NCAAs.

Before this year even began, the Engineers lost their best player, junior guard Marco Coppola, to an ankle injury, but they responded positively with 17 wins in their first 18 games.

The Engineers dropped back-to-back games to Emerson and Babson earlier this month, and injuries have continued to nag WPI in recent weeks. Senior forward Ryan Kolb has been hampered by a foot injury and sophomore point guard Aaron Davis missed the last four games with a groin injury.

Like they did when Coppola went down, the Engineers reacted resolutely to what could have been setbacks.

"I'm really pumped up about our guys," Bartley said. "When we lost two in a row I think it really got us refocused. We simplified some things and our guys got together and said, 'Hey, we can play much better than we're playing,' and we just started playing the right way. To lose Coppola and then Davis, this team continues to plow through any problems."

Davis is questionable for the NEWMAC tourney.

Harrington stepped into the starting lineup after Davis went down in the Babson game Feb. 8.

He scored a season-high 11 points in last week's win over Wheaton. With Coppola last year and junior guard Sam Longwell and Kolb leading the way this year, WPI hasn't needed Harrington to be a big scorer. He's earned his minutes at the defensive end.

LaBove had a career-high 15 rebounds in an win over Fitchburg State this season. Like Harrington, he has aided WPI's defensive efforts, both in the post and on the perimeter.

Longwell, the team's leading scorer (16.5 ppg), has had an all-conference season and junior Domenick Mastascusa (11.5 ppg, 4.6 rpg) is developing into a top frontcourt player.

"They've allowed us to maintain that confidence and belief that we can get this done," Bartley said.

Crusaders will miss Hamilton

Cullen Hamilton was one of Holy Cross' top scorers early in the year, but a knee injury knocked the 6-2 guard's promising sophomore season off track.

Holy Cross coach Milan Brown said Sunday that Hamilton will not play again this year.

In the Nov. 23 game against Belmont, Hamilton suffered a partial tear of the patellar tendon and missed the next six games. He returned to action Dec. 28 at Michigan and played in 12 more games, mostly coming off the bench. Despite a great effort, he never showed the form he did in HC's first five games of 2013-14 when he averaged 16.2 points. He averaged 5.1 points over those last 13 games.

"He literally gave us his leg," Brown said. "He tried to do all he can, but he developed some scar tissue in there. For him, like he said, it's more of a relief. He couldn't play the way he wanted to play, but he didn't want to let his team down by not giving everything he had. As the guys said the other day in the team meeting, every game from here on out Cullen will be on their brains because he literally gave us his knee trying to make us a good team, so we'll give him everything we have."

The Crusaders, who have clinched a home Patriot League Tournament quarterfinal game, have two regular-season games remaining, tonight at Loyola and Saturday at home against Boston University.

At 11-5, HC stands in third place in the league standings, behind BU (13-3) and American (12-4), and can claim at least the No. 3 seed with a win at Loyola. The Crusaders can move up to No. 2 with two wins and two American losses.

Lancers' Gibson earns honors

Worcester State junior Terrence Gibson was named the U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association Division 3 National Track Athlete of the Week.

At last weekend's Division 3 New England Indoor Championships at MIT, Gibson shattered school, meet and facility records with top finishes in the 60 (6.80 seconds) and 60 hurdles (8.02).

Gibson was the first male WSU Division 3 New England Indoor champion since Worcester State hall of famer Stanley Egbor (55, 200) accomplished the feat in 2001.

Gibson also ran the third leg of the Lancers' second-place 1,600 relay. He picked up 20 of WSU's 40 points to lead the Lancers to an eighth-place finish.

The Lancers men's basketball team started 1-9, but was 10-4 in its last 14 games heading into Tuesday night's MASCAC quarterfinal against Framingham State.

The 6-foot-5 Jobst averages 16.7 points and 13.5 rebounds, both team bests, as has been a consistent post presence and scoring threat all over the court. He is one of nine Division 3 players with 15 or more double-doubles this season.

Jobst, who transferred to Worcester State from St. Joseph's (Vt.) before last season, is getting it done off the court as well.

Last week, Jobst was named a Capital One Division 3 Academic First-Team All-American. He is the first WSU student-athlete to earn first-team honors and the first Lancers men's basketball player to be selected as an Academic All-American.

Contact Jennifer Toland at jtoland@telegram.com. Follow her on Twitter @JenTandG.